Inside/Outside: migrants' construction of home in the domestic kitchen

© 2012 Zoya K. GillThis thesis explores the everyday lives of middle class, inner suburban first- and second-generation migrants to Melbourne through their activities in the kitchen. It speaks to current and past work on multiculturalism, food culture and identity in order to develop an exploration of the ways in which migrants create senses of belonging, self, and home in the contexts of cultural difference and diversity. It looks at the ways in which migrants use the kitchen as a space of becoming. It also addresses how a migrant constructs personal ideas of what it means to be Australian in order to place him or herself in relation to it. The process of migration often engenders both a fragmentation of identity and a fragmentation of sense of belonging - the ways in which migrants return to totalities of self through activities in the kitchen are the main focus of this thesis. Additionally, it shall be looking at the influence of the outside world on the home and how this affects the process of becoming that a migrant goes through in his or her new country. This process requires pragmatism with regards to identity construction and performance – a negotiation between the home and host nation and between the past and present. Migrants often use activities in the kitchen to creatively recreate the past and, in doing so construct a sense of ‘homeliness’. This involves developing and reaffirming networks and relations through which a migrant can develop a space in which to belong. Furthermore, it shall be exploring ideas surrounding individualism and agency in creating identity as well as how the negotiation between creativity and reproduction in producing meals speaks to the creativity of identity performance that exists within an individualist framework. Additionally it shall look at what happens when control over identity performance and self-representation on the part of the individual is lost